In the first stage, Peloton experienced a 174-kilometre flight from Bergen to Voss. Young Belgian Jens Reynders has settled into today’s race, which, thanks to teams aiming for classification, is locked into plenty of time.
The decision came due to the challenging final climb of more than two kilometres, with an average gradient of 8.4 percent. Quick Step-Alpha Vinyl has kept things in check and put Remco Evenepoel in a seat for the past few hectares.
Eduard Prades lit the fuse on this, but the Spaniard from Caja Rural soon got his head on. The winner of the Liège-Bastogne-Liège spoke everyone off his leash and sprinted towards victory. With Cian Uijtdebroek and Laurens Huys, two other Belgians took the two top ten spots.
Evenepoel is of course the number one leader as well. Thanks to the bonuses, he is four seconds ahead of Norway’s Tobias Johansen in the standings. “I wasn’t expecting I would be so good on day one,” Evenpoel replied after the end. “It was a very steep climb.”
Note: In the full final, Evenpool set himself aside for a health hiatus. He laughed, “I really had to stop or my bladder would explode.”
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